Hearing for death penalty scheduled

MORRIS, Ill. (AP)—A death penalty hearing is scheduled Monday for a Pontiac Correctional Center inmate found guilty of murder in the 1987 fatal stabbing of the prison superintendent.

Friday a Grundy County jury convicted 34-year-old Roosevelt Lucas of Chicago of five counts of first-degree murder in the slaying of Pontiac Superintendent Robert L. Taylor.

Taylor served as liasion between inmates and the prison’s wardens and assistant wardens.

Lucas sat emotionless at the defense table in the courtroom as the jury foreman read each guilty verdict. He had been serving an 80-year sentence at the prison for the Sept. 22, 1984, murder of a Chicago bicycle-shop employee.

Livingston County Circuit Judge Charles Glennon presided at the trial, which was moved to Grundy County.

Jurors deliberated Thursday and part of Friday before reaching a verdict after six days of testimony.

Prosecutors believed the attack on Taylor, 44, was ordered by leaders of a gang in the prison in retaliation for the slaying of an inmate six weeks earlier.

The attack was characterized as a “well-orchestrated gang assassination” that made Lucas “a hero in the gang’s eyes,” said Livingston County Assistant State’s Attorney James Casson in closing arguments Thursday.

Casson and defense attorney Robert Willis of Chicago focused most of their comments on key testimony from inmates Lawrence Spiller and Demetre Brown, who said they saw Lucas and Ike Easley, 27, participate in the attack on Taylor.

Casson said the inmates’ testimony was supported by physical evidence, including Easley’s fingerprint on a 12-inch homemade knife and his footprint on a piece of computer paper found in Taylor’s office.

Brown testified that after Lucas and Easley attacked Taylor, Lucas entered the office and pulled a pipe out of his pants.

Brown said he then saw two other inmates leave the office, and that Lucas and Easley ran out a short time later.

Easley, also convicted of murder in Taylor’s slaying, was sentenced to death by a Will County jury last summer.